Global Pulse

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  • Samsung workers approve bonus deal after big AI profits

    Samsung workers approve bonus deal after big AI profits

    South Korea’s largest tech and semiconductor powerhouse Samsung Electronics has avoided a potentially economy-altering work stoppage after union members voted overwhelmingly to approve a landmark 10-year bonus agreement that unlocks massive payouts for semiconductor workers, fueled by skyrocketing global demand for AI infrastructure. More than 73% of voting union members supported the deal struck with management last week, ending a standoff that had included threats of an 18-day strike — a disruption that sent ripples of concern across South Korea’s economy, where Samsung Electronics alone contributes 12.5% of national GDP and memory chips account for roughly 35% of the country’s total exports.

    The agreement, which ties payouts to aggressive performance targets, allocates 10.5% of the semiconductor division’s annual operating profit to worker bonuses paid in company stock, plus an additional 1.5% payout in cash. Based on current market projections for annual operating profit, roughly 78,000 of Samsung’s 125,000 domestic employees will qualify for an estimated payout of around $370,000 this year. The vote, held electronically over six days concluding Wednesday, drew participation from more than 95% of eligible union members, with 62,600 total ballots cast.

    Samsung’s earnings have exploded in recent months, driven by frenzied global demand for the high-capacity memory chips that power AI data centers. The company reported a 750% year-over-year jump in first-quarter operating profit in April, and earlier this month its market capitalization crossed the $1 trillion threshold for the first time in corporate history.

    While the deal has averted a strike, it has ignited widespread tensions across multiple groups: non-semiconductor workers at Samsung, employees at the company’s listed subsidiaries, and shareholders. A smaller union representing workers in underperforming divisions including mobile devices, displays, and consumer electronics — where profits have either stagnated or declined — filed a court injunction Tuesday to block the agreement, arguing it disproportionately favors semiconductor staff. Workers at separate listed Samsung affiliates, such as Samsung Display, Samsung SDI, and Samsung Electro-Mechanics, have also expressed discontent, as their bonus structures deliver far smaller payouts even as parent company profits surge. A group of retail shareholders has also threatened legal action, claiming the bonus scheme was approved without their input.

    Beyond Samsung’s internal walls, the agreement has sparked a broader national conversation about how windfall profits from the AI boom should be distributed across South Korean society. A senior official from South Korea’s presidential office has even proposed exploring a “national dividend” program, which would redirect excess tax revenue from AI-related corporate gains to fund expanded social welfare programs.

    Industry analysts note that the generous bonuses serve a strategic purpose for Samsung: retaining top domestic engineering talent that has increasingly been targeted by U.S. tech and automotive firms, including Tesla, which are ramping up their own investments in AI chip development and production. For context, the Samsung union points out that workers at rival South Korean chipmaker SK hynix received bonuses more than three times larger than Samsung’s payouts last year.

    The massive windfalls for chip workers at both Samsung and SK hynix have already reshaped South Korea’s social hierarchy, elevating semiconductor engineering to one of the country’s most desirable professions. A simple branded jacket with the SK hynix logo went viral on South Korean social media earlier this month, with users joking it served as a “golden ticket” to luxury shopping and improved dating opportunities. Local news agency Yonhap reports that chip workers now see their “marriage market value” surge, with desirability ratings from matchmaking agency Sunoo rising to nearly match the traditionally elite professions of doctors and lawyers.

    The Samsung deal has also emboldened labor organizers across South Korea, with workers in sectors from biotechnology and automotive manufacturing to shipbuilding and information technology now pushing for larger shares of corporate profits through expanded bonus programs.

  • From barefoot kid, to millionaire star, Caiceido keeps chasing trophies

    From barefoot kid, to millionaire star, Caiceido keeps chasing trophies

    Deep in the working-class hills of Ecuador’s Mujer Trabajadora neighborhood, 24-year-old Chelsea star Moises Caicedo lifted his very first piece of silverware decades ago: a dented golden plastic cup, borrowed from a neighbor just to let a ragtag group of local kids experience the thrill of victory. That humble moment, captured in a faded childhood photograph, remains one of the most cherished keepsakes of Jeremy Cedeno, Caicedo’s lifelong friend and now a local paramedic.

    The photo shows a young, grinning Caicedo kneeling surrounded by five small teammates, his small hands clamped around the toy trophy from an informal neighborhood tournament played on unmarked dirt. There were no referees, no line markers, and no proper gear—Cedeno recalled to AFP that tackles were brutal, and players often took the field barefoot. Today, that same wide, victorious smile is one that millions of football fans around the world recognize, as Caicedo prepares to represent Ecuador at his second consecutive World Cup, kicking off in June 2026.

    Caicedo’s journey from a poor youngest child in a family of 10 to one of the most expensive footballers in English Premier League history is a story of relentless grit. As a child, he supplemented his family’s income by selling flowers in a local cemetery, and he often helped his youth coach park cars in the city’s entertainment district to earn small change for club equipment. His first coach Ivan Guerra, who still runs the same local football school that gave Caicedo his start, remembers the primitive pitch where the star cut his teeth: a rough expanse of mud, stones, sand, and scattered broken glass. Today, Guerra uses Caicedo’s story to teach every young player at the academy that hard work is the only path to turning dreams into reality.

    Darwin Castillo, who coached Caicedo as a teenager at Jaipadida club, recalled a quiet, shy young man who blended in with his peers but already stood out for his unmatched discipline and natural physical ability. That discipline, Castillo says, came from Caicedo’s humble upbringing: a tight-knit poor family that said grace before every meal, and that instilled core values of gratitude and humility that the star has never lost.

    Caicedo made the breakthrough to top-tier European football in 2023, when his British record 115 million pound ($147 million) transfer from Brighton & Hove Albion to Chelsea made him the most expensive player in Ecuador’s national team history. He notched 50 appearances for the Blues in his first full season, scoring five goals and lifting the Club World Cup trophy with the club in the United States in July 2025. On that special day, he tied an Ecuadorian flag around his waist, a quiet tribute to the country and neighborhood that made him. He has since earned a national medal for sporting merit from the Ecuadorian National Assembly, where he reaffirmed his commitment to staying the same humble kid who never forgot his roots.

    Castillo says Caicedo has kept that promise. Today, the star’s face adorns murals across his hometown of Santo Domingo, printed on youth jerseys and even emblazoned on the shin guards of local kids like 9-year-old Julian Hidalgo, who dreams of following in Caicedo’s footsteps and plays under the same coach Guerra. When Caicedo returns home for holidays, he spends his days just as he did as a kid: hitting the beach, riding local Ferris wheels, and kicking a ball around the neighborhood with his former coaches and childhood friends, slipping right back into being the barefoot kid who just loved to play.

    With his second World Cup just weeks away, Caicedo’s journey remains far from over. From that borrowed plastic trophy to global stardom, the driving force that pushed him out of poverty is still pushing him forward to chase more silverware.

  • Buoyant Japan coach targets World Cup glory despite Mitoma blow

    Buoyant Japan coach targets World Cup glory despite Mitoma blow

    Against a backdrop of back-to-back historic upsets over global football powerhouses Brazil and England, Japan men’s national football team head coach Hajime Moriyasu remains unshaken in his bold goal of lifting the 2026 FIFA World Cup trophy — even as a devastating hamstring injury rules out star winger Kaoru Mitoma just days before the squad announcement.

    The 28-year-old Brighton & Hove Albion speedster, who was entering a career peak form ahead of the tournament and scored the match-winning goal against England at Wembley earlier this year, will miss the global showpiece. Mitoma’s absence marks the second high-profile injury blow for Japan, following Monaco attacker Takumi Minamino’s December knee ligament tear that also ruled him out of the competition. Yet Moriyasu argues that his squad’s deep strength in depth, built on a core of players plying their trade at top European clubs, is more than capable of filling the gap left by the in-form winger.

    History shows just that: when Japan claimed their first ever win over five-time World Cup champions Brazil last October, overturning a 2-0 half-time deficit to seal a dramatic 3-2 victory in Tokyo, Mitoma was already sidelined. “That reflects the team concept, that anyone can come into the line-up and the team still performs,” Moriyasu noted of the squad’s collective ethos. The historic result against Brazil was followed by another first for Japanese football in March, when they became the first Asian men’s national team to beat England on home soil, a 1-0 win that cemented growing belief in the side’s ability to compete with the world’s best.

    Japan, the first nation to qualify for the 2026 tournament, has been drawn into Group F alongside the Netherlands, Sweden and Tunisia, kicking off their campaign against the Dutch in Dallas on June 14. Unlike past squads that heavily relied on domestic league talent, Moriyasu’s 2026 roster features only three players from Japan’s top-flight J.League, with the remaining 23 spots filled by players competing across Europe’s top competitions. Key stars that have overcome long-term injury layoffs to make the squad include Liverpool defensive midfielder Wataru Endo and Arsenal defender Takehiro Tomiyasu, while Feyenoord striker Ayase Ueda brings consistent goalscoring threat, with Crystal Palace’s Daichi Kamada and Real Sociedad’s Takefusa Kubo rounding out the attacking core.

    Half of the current squad already has experience at the 2022 Qatar World Cup, where Japan pulled off two of the biggest upsets in tournament history: back-to-back 2-1 wins over four-time champions Germany and 2010 winners Spain to top their group, before bowing out to Croatia in a penalty shootout in the round of 16. That run extended Japan’s pattern of reaching the last 16 four times in their World Cup history — but they have never advanced past that stage to the quarter-finals. Moriyasu is targeting an unprecedented run all the way to the title this time around, and Mitoma’s injury has done nothing to change that goal.

    “We have more players with World Cup experience and that will help us in terms of the team’s composure,” Moriyasu said. “It will help us perform effectively in a variety of situations.”

    Japan cruised through the Asian qualifying stage, securing their spot with three matches to spare and dropping only three points before their final dead-rubber loss. This tournament marks their eighth consecutive World Cup appearance, dating back to their debut in 1998. Moriyasu, Japan’s longest-serving national team head coach who took the reins after the 2018 World Cup, brings a wealth of high-level experience himself, having led Japan at two Asian Cups, the Tokyo Olympics, and the 2022 World Cup after winning three J.League titles with club side Sanfrecce Hiroshima.

    “The target doesn’t change,” he insisted of the World Cup glory goal. “But it’s not just about that target, it’s about raising our level as individuals and as a team. It’s not just about my own experience. The managers that have gone before me, both foreign and Japanese, and my staff also have experience of the World Cup. I want to use that experience and knowledge to increase our chances, no matter how slightly.”

  • Bolivian Congress OK’s use of troops against protesters

    Bolivian Congress OK’s use of troops against protesters

    Six months into the center-right presidency of Rodrigo Paz, the Andean nation of Bolivia remains roiled by mass anti-government demonstrations driven by deep public anger over widespread economic hardship. On Tuesday, the country’s lower congressional chamber took the controversial step of approving the repeal of a 2020 regulation designed to limit executive power to impose states of emergency and crack down on street protests, voting by a more than two-thirds majority to clear the way for Paz to deploy military forces across protest hotspots. The regulation, which required congressional pre-approval for any state of emergency and barred presidents from deploying the military for crowd control, was originally drafted by a socialist-led legislature in the wake of 2019’s deadly unrest that killed 36 people and forced longtime socialist leader Evo Morales from office. The repeal passed the Senate in an accelerated vote last week, and moved through the lower chamber in just seven days using an expedited process that bypasses standard legislative procedures. The vote leaves the government free to declare a national state of emergency, restrict core civil liberties including freedom of movement and freedom of assembly, and bring uniformed soldiers into the streets to counter ongoing demonstrations that have paralyzed the capital of La Paz. What began as a series of targeted trade union actions in early May, focused on demands for higher wages, consistent fuel access and more competent economic stewardship, has rapidly expanded into a broad national movement calling for Paz’s immediate resignation. Protesters have blocked all major entry routes to La Paz, forcing most retail businesses to close their doors over fears of escalating violence, and left the capital facing critical shortages of food, medicine and fuel. In recent weeks, Paz has taken a series of small, symbolic steps to defuse public anger ahead of the congressional vote: most notably, he announced Monday a 50% cut to his own presidential salary, which currently stands at roughly 24,000 Bolivian bolivianos (about $3,500) per month. While this salary is among the lowest for any sitting Latin American head of state, 2024 International Labor Organization data shows it is roughly eight times the monthly income of the average Bolivian worker. The move has done little to quiet the growing revolt against Paz’s policies, which the president argues are necessary to pull Bolivia out of its worst economic crisis in decades. Opposition lawmakers and human rights advocates have harshly condemned the congressional vote, warning it sets the stage for widespread human rights abuses and will only escalate tensions rather than resolve the crisis. Opposition legislator Sonia Sinani argued the repeal would do nothing but “pour gasoline on the flames” of already intense public anger, while colleague Alejandro Reyes compared the new expanded executive power to a “strait jacket” on civil society. The Paz administration, for its part, has framed the unrest as a deliberate attempt to overthrow the country’s democratic order, and has accused former president Morales—who is currently in hiding to avoid arrest on trafficking charges he strongly denies—of secretly orchestrating the current wave of protests to seize back power.

  • Hundreds of children die within months as measles cases soar in Bangladesh

    Hundreds of children die within months as measles cases soar in Bangladesh

    For Al Amin, a Dhaka resident, the memory of his 4-year-old daughter Akira remains unbearably vivid. He remembers how quickly she learned to speak, how she had already begun picking up English words before her fourth birthday, how she was the beloved center of both sides of their family. But that bright light was cut short by a preventable disease: measles.

    Akira’s parents did everything right, Al Amin says. They tried four separate times to get her the routine measles vaccine that could have saved her life. The first two attempts were called off – health workers turned them away because Akira had a cold, assuring the family the shot could wait until she turned five. On the third and fourth trips, they were met with a different barrier: the vaccine was simply out of stock.

    In early March, Akira developed what Al Amin thought was a routine fever. After an initial hospital visit, she was sent home, only to develop the hallmark signs of measles: a spreading rash, soaring temperature, and painful mouth sores. She was admitted and discharged five times before clinicians finally diagnosed her with the highly contagious viral illness. By then, it was too late. Akira was placed on life support, and died 27 days after she first sought care.

    Akira’s death is far from an isolated tragedy. Since the start of March, Bangladesh’s Ministry of Health confirms more than 500 children with confirmed or suspected measles have died across the country. Official data puts total suspected cases at more than 60,000, with thousands of results still pending laboratory confirmation.

    Measles spreads rapidly through respiratory droplets from coughs and sneezes, and poses the deadliest risk to unvaccinated children under the age of five. Right now, Bangladesh’s healthcare system is buckling under the weight of the outbreak: multiple reports confirm parents are struggling to secure hospital beds for their sick children, and UNICEF field teams found hospitals across the country are overwhelmed. UNICEF staff have been deployed to help implement patient isolation and triage protocols at facilities that lack these critical systems. For many families living in rural areas with underresourced local clinics, the only option is to travel to major urban centers in search of care – a journey that often comes too late for low-income families who delay care to avoid the cost of private medicines and tests, according to Dr. Mushtaq Husain, former Principal Scientific Officer at Bangladesh’s Institute of Epidemiology Disease Control and Research. If local care had stronger resourcing, he noted, far fewer children would require emergency hospitalization.

    UNICEF’s Bangladesh country head Rana Flowers described the crisis as a “perfect storm” of overlapping risk factors. Public health officials first detected small clusters of measles cases in 2023, but a series of factors allowed the virus to spiral into a full outbreak. These include long-running gaps in routine vaccination that date back to the COVID-19 pandemic, when door-to-door vaccine outreach was halted to prevent viral spread, and many parents avoided hospital visits out of fear of contracting COVID. High population density in urban centers like Dhaka and refugee-hosting Cox’s Bazar, plus large population movements around major holidays, have also accelerated transmission.

    But Flowers emphasized one factor stands out above the rest: procurement delays for routine vaccines. Following 2024 political upheaval that saw long-time ruler Sheikh Hasina flee the country and an interim government take power ahead of February 2026 elections, the interim administration moved to restructure Bangladesh’s vaccine purchasing process, a change that UNICEF repeatedly warned carried major risk. “I sat with the interim advisor and staff on at least ten occasions,” Flowers said. “Saying we are worried, look at my face, I am worried you are going to face an outage.”

    Md Sayedur Rahman, former Special Assistant to the interim chief advisor for health, pushed back against this claim in a social media post, saying “no change was implemented in the vaccine procurement process during the tenure of the interim government” and that a “regular and consistent collaborative relationship regarding vaccine matters was maintained with UNICEF.”

    After the outbreak escalated, Bangladesh launched a mass emergency vaccination campaign in early April, with support from UNICEF and other international aid groups. So far, the campaign has shown early success: new infections have begun to decline in the hardest-hit regions that were prioritized for vaccination, and case numbers are plateauing in those areas. But public health experts note it takes three to four weeks for vaccine-derived immunity to build, so full national impact will take time to materialize. Bangladesh’s Health and Family Welfare Minister Sardar Sakhawat Hossain told the BBC he expects nationwide case numbers to drop soon. “It takes three to four weeks after the vaccination to create antibodies in the babies. We expect by next week, Inshallah, it will come down,” Hossain said. The minister also rejected calls to declare a national public health emergency, saying district-level facilities are prepared to support intensive care units in remote regions, and that “Bangladesh is able to handle.”

    Still, many experts remain concerned that upcoming Eid holiday travel could fuel a new wave of transmission, as millions of people travel across the country to gather with family. “Thousands of children will travel with their parents from town to village, village to town,” Husain warned. “There will be mixing of children with a fever, with the virus.”

    To prevent further spread, the government has already cancelled all scheduled Eid holiday leave for doctors and nurses working on outbreak response. For families who have already lost children, though, no action can bring back their loved ones. Al Amin still blames himself and the healthcare system for Akira’s death, saying the family suspects she contracted the virus in a hospital waiting room, where measles patients were mixed with other patients. “From the ticket counter line to the x-ray room, there was a measles patient everywhere,” he said. Today, he still visits Akira’s grave regularly, and relies on prescription sleeping pills to get through the night. “Today I cried for over an hour beside her graveyard,” he says. “I have so many questions inside me.”

  • Attorney General Ken Paxton wins Texas Senate primary, defeating veteran congressman Cornyn

    Attorney General Ken Paxton wins Texas Senate primary, defeating veteran congressman Cornyn

    On Tuesday night, Texas Republican primary voters delivered a historic political upset: state Attorney General Ken Paxton ousted four-term incumbent Senator John Cornyn in a high-stakes runoff election that has already reshaped the national battle for control of the U.S. Senate. Though pollsters and political analysts had forecast Paxton’s win for weeks, the defeat of a 23-year congressional veteran who served 12 years in Senate Republican leadership ranks stands as one of the most shocking incumbent losses in modern GOP primary history. The brutal campaign also set a new milestone as the most expensive Senate primary contest in U.S. history.

    The results clear the way for a fiercely competitive general election matchup in November, where Paxton will face Democratic state legislator James Talarico. The outcome of this Texas race will play a decisive role in whether Democrats can recapture a majority in the U.S. Senate for the final two years of Donald Trump’s second presidential term. National Democrats have long viewed Paxton as a more vulnerable general election candidate than the broadly popular Cornyn, and they are already framing the contest as a rare opportunity to flip a long-held Republican Senate seat in a deep-red state that has not sent a Democrat to the U.S. Senate since 1994.

    Already confident of his primary success heading into Tuesday, 62-year-old Paxton began shifting his focus to the general election more than a week ago, rolling out statewide television attack ads that label Talarico a dangerous left-wing extremist out of step with Texas values. Most pre-runoff polling pointed to a tight general election in November, underscoring the competitiveness of the upcoming contest.

    Cornyn’s defeat marks the second time in the 2026 Republican primary cycle that a sitting GOP U.S. senator has been ousted by a challenger backed by Trump. Just 10 days before the Texas runoff, Louisiana incumbent Bill Cassidy failed to even advance to his state’s GOP runoff, finishing behind two Trump-endorsed challengers. It has been 46 years since at least two sitting senators from the same party lost their renomination bids in a single election cycle, a statistic that highlights the ongoing upheaval reshaping the modern Republican Party.

    While both incumbents fell to Trump-aligned challengers, the parallels between the two losses end there. Unlike Cassidy, who broke with Trump by voting to convict him during his 2021 second impeachment trial, Cornyn built a long record as a reliable party loyalist who frequently highlighted his close working relationship with the president. Though he was slow to throw his support behind Trump’s 2024 re-election bid, Cornyn consistently voted in line with GOP priorities throughout his Senate tenure.

    In the first round of primary voting held back in March, Cornyn finished a narrow lead over Paxton, taking 42.5% of the vote to Paxton’s 40.8%. Neither candidate hit the 50% vote threshold required to avoid a runoff, setting up Tuesday’s decisive contest. Immediately after the March round of voting, political observers widely speculated that Trump was on the cusp of endorsing Cornyn, who was widely respected within national Republican circles for his robust fundraising record and senior leadership experience. That endorsement never materialized, however.

    Despite facing years of lingering personal and political scandals, Paxton emerged as the clear favorite of Trump’s populist conservative base in Texas. He structured his entire primary campaign around attacking 74-year-old Cornyn as a creature of the Washington political establishment, arguing the incumbent was too moderate, too out of touch with grassroots Texas conservatives, and too entrenched in the old guard of Capitol Hill politics to represent the state’s changing GOP electorate. Even as Cornyn outspent Paxton by a staggering 9-to-1 margin in the runoff, Paxton’s grassroots support held solid.

    Last week, as it became increasingly clear that Paxton was on track for a win, Trump formally endorsed the challenger. On social media, Trump accused Cornyn of “extreme disloyalty,” claiming the senator had failed to fight aggressively enough to advance Trump’s preferred voting reform legislation. Political analysts have framed Paxton’s victory as the latest proof of the enduring power of Trump’s endorsement in GOP primaries: Trump has already notched multiple primary wins this cycle for candidates he backed, including the ousters of Cassidy and a primary defeat for anti-Trump incumbent Representative Thomas Massie in Kentucky.

    Yet the timing of Trump’s endorsement in the Texas race tells a more nuanced story: rather than leading his base to pick Paxton, the president followed the clear direction of grassroots Republican voters, who have remained hungry for firebrand populist candidates and deeply skeptical of longtime Washington insiders. While Cassidy’s defeat demonstrated that Trump can still mobilize GOP voters to oust his critics, the Texas runoff reveals that the populist impulses driving the modern Republican base are sometimes larger and more independently driven than even the former president’s influence.

  • Holiday-makers in limbo as Aussie travel firm AVG Travels collapses into liquidation

    Holiday-makers in limbo as Aussie travel firm AVG Travels collapses into liquidation

    A Melbourne-headquartered budget travel company that built its brand around the promise of affordable global getaways for Australian travelers has officially entered liquidation, leaving thousands of customers scrambling to salvage their upcoming holiday plans. AVG Travels, which marketed itself on the slogan of helping customers ‘travel more and spend less’ by offering discounted international tour packages, appointed insolvency specialists from firm McGrathNicol as liquidators this week, following growing public frustration and widespread reports of sudden tour cancellations ahead of scheduled departures.

    For days before the formal liquidation announcement, customers had already faced cascading uncertainty, with many sharing that their pre-booked trips had been abruptly canceled or flagged for review just 48 to 72 hours before their planned departure dates. The sudden collapse caught many travelers off guard, who had booked with the company specifically for its advertised low rates on popular international routes across Asia, including Japan, Sri Lanka and China.

    Curiously, AVG Travels’ public website remains active as of the latest update, still displaying promotional advertisements advertising deep discounts on holiday packages to the destinations the company has long specialized in. However, first-time visitors to the site are now greeted by a pop-up notification confirming the liquidation status, which reads: ‘Matthew Hutton and Mark Holland of McGrathNicol were appointed liquidators of AVG Travels Pty Ltd (In Liquidation) on 26 May 2026. Please direct any queries to McGrathNicol on AVGTRAVELS@mcgrathnicol.com.’ The identical notice has also been posted physically on the entrance of AVG Travels’ Melbourne headquarters, barring access to walk-in customers seeking assistance.

    In an official statement released following the appointment, McGrathNicol confirmed that it has taken full control of AVG Travels’ business operations and outstanding assets. The firm said it is currently conducting an urgent, comprehensive review of the collapsed travel company’s financial standing and day-to-day affairs, with the core goal of identifying the path forward that will preserve as much value as possible for all stakeholders, including affected customers and outstanding creditors. McGrathNicol also noted that all customers holding existing, pre-paid bookings with AVG Travels will be contacted directly with updates as the review process moves forward. Further details on the outcome of the liquidation process and potential refunds or recoveries for customers are expected to be released in the coming weeks.

  • North Korea says it tested new warheads, technology and navigation in latest launches

    North Korea says it tested new warheads, technology and navigation in latest launches

    In a move that escalates regional military tensions on the Korean Peninsula, North Korea officially announced Wednesday that its latest round of projectile launches carried out Tuesday involved a suite of advanced weapon systems — including a nuclear-capable cruise missile powered by artificial intelligence navigation, which leader Kim Jong Un has ordered deployed to front-line units positioned opposite South Korea. The disclosure comes amid Pyongyang’s sustained push to expand and modernize its nuclear and conventional military capabilities, a years-long effort that has shifted into higher gear in recent years.

    The confirmation from North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) followed a Tuesday statement from South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, which first announced it had detected multiple projectiles launched into the peninsula’s western waters, including at least one short-range ballistic missile that traveled approximately 80 kilometers. South Korean officials did not initially identify other weapons tested in the exercise, and did not issue an immediate response to North Korea’s full disclosure of the test components.

    According to KCNA’s detailed account, Kim Jong Un personally oversaw Tuesday’s test activities, which featured three distinct types of armaments: ballistic missiles fitted with new warheads engineered for battlefield nuclear deployment, the AI-guided nuclear-capable cruise missiles, and 240-millimeter rocket artillery outfitted with cutting-edge “ultra-precision” navigation systems. The outlet added that Kim expressed full satisfaction with the test results, particularly the performance of the new cruise missile systems, which are earmarked for assignment to front-line long-range artillery units stationed along the inter-Korean border.

    Kim further ordered accelerated work to modernize and bolster North Korea’s artillery corps, with the goal of building a force that “no one can match,” KCNA reported.

    The latest tests align with a well-documented pattern of escalating military development from Pyongyang that began after 2019, when nuclear diplomacy between Kim and then-U.S. President Donald Trump collapsed without reaching a disarmament agreement. In the years since, Kim has adopted an increasingly hard-line stance toward Seoul, officially branding South Korea North Korea’s “most hostile enemy” and moving to sever decades-old established diplomatic and communication ties between the two nations. Just one week before the latest tests, during a meeting with senior military commanders, Kim outlined plans to strengthen border front-line units as part of a state objective to transform the entire inter-Korean frontier into “an impregnable fortress,” per prior KCNA reports.

    In recent years, Kim has also reshaped North Korea’s foreign policy orientation, leaning heavily into closer alignment with Moscow. Multiple open-source and Western intelligence reports confirm that North Korea has supplied thousands of troops and massive shipments of conventional weapons to Russia to support its ongoing full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Pyongyang has also sought to deepen its longstanding economic and strategic partnership with China, its primary ally and main economic lifeline, while framing itself as a core member of a growing global counter-Washington bloc.

    Despite former President Trump’s repeated public calls to restart bilateral diplomacy with Kim, Pyongyang has rejected all such overtures to date, maintaining that Washington must first drop its requirement that North Korea commit to nuclear disarmament as a precondition for any renewed negotiations.

  • Dang Van Phuoc, AP combat photographer who lost an eye in the Vietnam War, dies at 91

    Dang Van Phuoc, AP combat photographer who lost an eye in the Vietnam War, dies at 91

    Dang Van Phuoc, the fearless former Associated Press photographer who built a legendary career covering the Vietnam War through devastating personal injury and immense hardship, has passed away at the age of 91. He died suddenly Saturday at his home in Southern California, confirmed his nephew Van Nguyen.

    Phuoc’s life was marked by struggle from its earliest days. Born in 1935 in a small Vietnamese village near Quang Ngai, south of Da Nang, he was orphaned by his mid-teens: his father was killed by Viet Cong insurgents when Phuoc was around 10 years old, and his mother died a few years later, leaving him homeless with no support system.

    In his young adulthood, Phuoc volunteered to carry equipment at a Saigon film studio where his aunt worked as a cook. It was in this space that he first encountered a camera, teaching himself the fundamentals of photography through self-guided practice and on-the-job observation.

    In 1965, Horst Faas, AP’s then–photo chief, hired Phuoc to replace a local photojournalist who had been killed while on assignment. It did not take long for Phuoc to earn a distinctive reputation among fellow journalists and coalition troops: he had an almost preternatural ability to reach the center of active combat, putting him in position to capture raw, unflinching images of the war that other photographers could not access. Faas would later dub Phuoc the news agency’s “secret weapon” for his unmatched prowess in the field. Phuoc regularly walked alongside the lead point man on combat patrols, a choice that produced extraordinary photography but exposed him to constant mortal danger.

    Over his 10-year tenure covering the war for AP, Phuoc sustained at least five separate combat injuries. Just five months after he was hired, a grenade explosion sprayed shrapnel into his chest and leg, but he returned to frontline reporting within a few months to continue covering the protracted conflict between North Vietnam’s Communist forces and the U.S.-backed South Vietnamese military. In 1968, he suffered a concussion when a rocket fragment struck his head while he documented intense street fighting in Saigon. That same year, he braved continuous sniper fire to carry a wounded U.S. soldier to safety, earning a formal commendation from the Ninth U.S. Army Infantry Division for his act of courage.

    The most devastating injury came in 1969, when a grenade explosion during a patrol with a U.S. Ranger battalion south of Da Nang cost Phuoc his right eye. Undeterred, he relearned how to frame and shoot photographs with a single eye and returned to his post within months. In a 2011 interview for AP’s institutional archives, Phuoc opened up about the unique challenges of working with one eye: he had to balance peering through his camera viewfinder while also staying alert for silent hand signals from the soldiers accompanying him on patrol.

    Huỳnh Công “Nick” Út, Phuoc’s colleague in AP’s Saigon bureau and the Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer behind the iconic image of a burned Vietnamese girl fleeing a napalm attack, remembered Phuoc as both a fearless professional and a devoted friend. “He was fearless and resourceful in the field,” Út said. “Behind the scenes, he was a giving man and loyal friend who treated me like a brother. When I heard he had passed, I cried, ‘My brother, he’s gone.’ Everyone loved him so much.”

    Though Phuoc was celebrated for his gripping combat photography, he often said the images that mattered most to him were those that captured the suffering of civilian civilians trapped in the crossfire of war. In the 2011 interview, he framed his work as a quiet act of service, comparing himself to “a small grain of sand” who used his camera to amplify unheard stories of civilian hardship to a global audience.

    When Saigon fell to North Vietnamese forces in 1975, Phuoc fled Vietnam with his family, carrying only the clothes on their backs and a single bottle of milk for his child. After being stranded in a Guam refugee camp, AP reporter Linda Deutsch—who was covering the camp at the time—intervened to help the family resettle, and they were flown to the U.S. to process at Camp Pendleton in Southern California.

    Phuoc briefly returned to Asia to work for AP’s Hong Kong bureau before leaving the news organization and settling permanently in Southern California with his family. He built a second career as a professional portrait photographer in Orange County, home to Little Saigon, the largest community of Vietnamese refugees outside Vietnam.

    In retirement, Phuoc remained deeply engaged in his craft and his community. He was a founding member of The Artistic Photography Association, where he trained generations of young emerging photographers. He also served as a civilian volunteer for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, and was named the county’s Volunteer of the Year in 1994.

    Kim Nguyen, Phuoc’s great-nephew, reflected on his legacy Tuesday, recalling the childhood portraits Phuoc took of him as an infant and a recent visit to a Vietnamese museum where he brought his own infant son to view Phuoc’s wartime work on public display.

  • Tim Picton accused Brodie Dewar to fight manslaughter charge at trial in WA Supreme Court

    Tim Picton accused Brodie Dewar to fight manslaughter charge at trial in WA Supreme Court

    A young man accused of delivering a fatal one-punch assault that killed a high-profile Australian Labor Party strategist has formally rejected a manslaughter charge and will proceed to a public trial in Western Australia’s highest court.

    Brodie Dewar, 20, entered a not guilty plea during a preliminary hearing held Tuesday at the Stirling Gardens Magistrates Court, responding directly to the magistrate’s reading of the charge with a clear “Not guilty, Your Honour.” The charge alleges Dewar unlawfully killed 36-year-old Tim Picton in an incident that unfolded on the night of December 27 last year outside a popular nightclub in Perth’s Northbridge entertainment district, under circumstances that do not meet the legal threshold for murder.

    According to court documents and official accounts, the altercation left Picton with severe head injuries. He was rushed to a local hospital immediately after the attack, where medical teams placed him in an induced coma in an effort to treat his trauma. Despite extensive medical intervention, Picton succumbed to his injuries several weeks after the incident.

    During Tuesday’s preliminary hearing, Dewar’s defense lawyer Simon Watters confirmed the defense team was prepared to move the case forward to trial in the Western Australian Supreme Court. Magistrates granted the request to commit the defendant to the higher court, scheduling Dewar’s first formal appearance in the Supreme Court for August 24.

    Before his death, Picton had built a significant reputation within Australian Labor circles, with a resume spanning multiple state branches of the party. A former president of South Australian Young Labor, he went on to work as a staffer for federal Labor Members of Parliament Amanda Rishworth and Don Farrell, and also held a role on the staff of former Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews before relocating to Western Australia. He was the younger brother of current South Australian State Development Minister Chris Picton, and political observers widely credit him with playing a pivotal behind-the-scenes role in former WA Premier Mark McGowan’s landslide election victory in 2021, a win that delivered Labor a historic majority in the state’s parliament.